


Book of the Stranger

by TarotJoie



Series: Missing Pieces [1]
Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: F/M, Hurt/Comfort, Past Abuse, season 6
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-25
Updated: 2019-07-25
Packaged: 2020-07-19 14:15:47
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,077
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19975441
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TarotJoie/pseuds/TarotJoie
Summary: The missing scene between Jon seeing Sansa at Castle Black and them sitting by the fire. Sansa tells Jon what happened to her and Theon.





	Book of the Stranger

Jon can’t believe his eyes. Truly. When he sees her standing there he knows he has died after all, for where else would she be, certainly not Castle Black. Two things had never been more incongruous together – the cold prison of debauched men and his sweet, radiant sister. 

His feet take him toward her and it isn’t until she is in his arms, her breath in his ear, her heart beating against his, that he accepts she is real.

“I thought you were dead,” he whispers as her arms tighten around his neck. 

“I did too, Jon. But I’m not. I made it to you. Oh, Jon.” 

She is crying against him now, her body trembling and her moans drawing more and more attention from the men surrounding them. They shouldn’t be seeing this, this moment should be just for them. 

“Sansa,” he says softly, lowering her to her feet but keeping her in his arms. “Let’s get you inside, come on.” 

Jon has to pull her gripping hands from his neck, but then he wraps them around his arm and keeps her near as he leads her up the stairs and into his solar. The tall woman and shy boy who’d accompanied her stand guard outside, both wary of him, but allowing him to close the door so they might speak in private.

She is crying now, almost hysterically, and before he can lead her to a chair she collapses to the floor in a fit of sobs. Jon wants to lift her to a more dignified and comfortable seat, but she is so overwrought that all he can do is kneel down and weep with her as she buries her face in his lap. 

“Shhh,” he soothes, running a hand through her tangled and filthy hair. “Sansa, it’s alright, I’ve got you. You’re safe now, I promise.” 

She lifts her body and sits back with his vow, searching his face for the truth in it, but all she can see is his scar. Jon watches her carefully, unsure what to make of her sudden shift in focus, and then flinches with surprise when she reaches out to trace the line from his brow to his cheek.

“You’re hurt,” she whispers oddly. Her gloved hand lingers on his face and he smiles at her in kind disbelief. 

“Long ago, sweet girl. It doesn’t hurt anymore.”

Sansa pulls her hand back sharply as if it burned, as if she’d only just realized what she was doing. That’s when he notices that her trembling is due to more than just her cries.

“Sansa, you’re freezing.” He takes both her arms in his hands and rubs methodically up and down before gently tugging her upward. “Come, you should sit by the fire.”

She hisses with strain as he helps her to her feet and they cross the small room together. When she’s seated he adds a few more logs to his hearth and then retrieves his old cloak from his days in Winterfell and drapes it over her back.

Her sobs have mostly settled, though tears still fall in a steady stream down her muddied face, streaking it with pale lines of salt. Jon watches her with caution and fear as he sits beside her before the fire. 

“Sansa,” he whispers, drawing her glazed eyes away from the flames. “What happened?”

The question is as absurd and impossible to answer as his own story, but he doesn’t know what else to say. The last he’d heard of his sister was that she’d been married off to Tyrion Lannister, and that sometime after he was arrested for killing the King. 

In truth, he’d thought she was dead, just like the rest of them. Like Robb, and Bran, and Rickon. And like Arya, whom he’s not heard anything of since his father was killed. He didn’t let himself think about her, for surely she must be dead too. Even if she’d somehow escaped King’s Landing, what young girl could survive on their own all these years undetected with the Lannisters hunting them. But Sansa is here, and she’s alive. If she could… no, he wouldn’t allow that hope.

“I ran away.” She sounds like a child confessing she’d abandoned her lessons to play in the woods. 

“From King’s Landing?” How could she have made it all this way?

Sansa shakes her head, lips trembling again as if it hurt to speak. “From Winterfell.”

“Winterfell? But, how did you… what were you…” His confused berate causes her to close her eyes in strained disorientation. “Sansa, Roose Bolton holds Winterfell.”

“I was married to his bastard,” she whimpers, eyes still shut tight. “R..Ramsay.”

This is so blatantly incomprehensible to him. Roose Bolton betrayed their family, he killed Robb. That Sansa would marry his son, that she’d been living there, at Winterfell, and he never knew. It’s impossible. “Why?” 

Sansa breaks down in another fit of wales, choking with her mouth hung open as liquid pours from her eyes and nose and lips. Jon moves to his knees in front of her and takes her face in his hands. He begs her silently to look at him but all she can do is cry until he presses his lips to her forehead, meeting her shudders with his own. Then he brings her face down to his chest and cradles her in his arms as she begins muttering her explanation. 

“Littlefinger… he… he wanted me to… he told me I would… Oh, Jon I didn’t know. I didn’t know… I’m sorry… I never should have trusted him.” 

“Sansa, it’s alright.” He presses another kiss into the top of her head, but it is for his own comfort now. “Slow down, it’s alright.”

She takes a stuttering breath, adjusting her grasp on his leathers to pull him closer. Then she starts to beg him in terrifying desperation. “Please, Jon. Don’t let him find me. Please.”

“Who, sweet girl? Littlefinger?”

Her face moves back and forth across his chest. “Ramsay. Please, Jon. You can’t let him take me, please don’t let him take me back there.” 

He pulls her tighter and swears it, but her sobs turn to gasps and soon she is so undone that he fears she will make herself ill. 

“Sansa, please. You have to calm yourself. I promise I’ll not let him take you. Oh, darling girl, what did he do to you?” Jon is pouring his own tears into her hair now and no matter how hard he tries to contain her in his arms, her back continues to heave in brutal waves against them. 

Then suddenly, with a final aching gasp, she collapses. His heart stops, and the terrifying shift of her body falling limp in his arms has him longing for her hysterics once again. But when he pulls her back for examination he sighs in relief to see that she is still breathing, steadier now in fact that her panic has rendered her unconscious. 

Jon balances her against him, keeping one arm secured at her back as he hooks the other beneath her knees and lifts her up. Then gently, ever so gently, he carries her to his bed chamber and lays her down on his furs. One more time he checks her breathing, placing a hand on her chest to feel it rise and fall, the rapid thrum of her heart bringing his own back to life. 

He watches her, completely lost as to what to do, completely unsure of how he came to be standing here when only moments ago he was packing his things and arguing with Edd about… he can’t even remember now. Somehow, in the space of only moments, a lifetime has run its course. And now there is only her. How did he get here? 

When he’s able to force his feet to move away, Jon opens the door to his solar and finds her guards still at their posts. Both turn to him with equal urgency, though the woman’s expression is almost accusing, while the boy looks as though he might cry as well. He doesn’t know who these people are, only that they’ve brought her to him, and for now that is enough to give them his trust.

“She’s sleeping,” he offers. The woman presses her lips and the boy lets out a breath he might have been holding since she’d left their sight. “I need to fetch her a bath and some food.”

The armed and armored woman nods in silent command to the boy and he practically disappears in his dash to fulfill the order. Jon steps out of the solar and quietly shuts the door behind him. He wipes a hand down the expanse of his face, realizing for the first time he’d been crying as it comes away wet. Then he crosses his arms and lifts his demanding eyes to the stranger before him, pleading in silence for answers to what he doesn’t yet know how to ask. 

“My lord,” she begins steadily, her voice stoic but also gentle, “my name is Brienne of Tarth. I was sworn to Lady Catelyn when she was still alive, and now I am pledged to your sister.”

“What happened to her?” 

Jon tries to suppress the fury burning in his gut as he questions this person he does not know, this woman who claims to be Sansa’s protector while the evidence is clear she has been anything but safe. 

“Lady Catelyn sent me to deliver Jaime Lannister to King’s Landing in exchange for Sansa. But when the King was murdered at his wedding before I could secure her, Peter Baelish stole her away to the Eyrie. From there, he made a marriage contract with Roose Bolton and sold her to his son. When she escaped, I found her in the woods heading north and brought her here.” 

Although the woman looms over him, Jon glares at her with a viciousness that seems to shrink her down to nothing. Somebody is responsible for the state of his sister. Somebody failed her, and until he can allow himself to face the impending, dormant truth – that the failing is his own – he needs to place his ire somewhere, and she’s standing right here. 

“What _happened_ to her,” he demands again through gritted, bared teeth, his lips twitching to contain his rage. 

The façade of her strength splinters, and she lowers her eyes in a way that reveals herself a woman after all. It is a look that only crosses the face of a woman burdened with the understanding of another woman’s suffering all too intimately. 

“The man she married was an unimaginable monster, my lord. She hasn’t told me the things he’s done to her, but I fear they are likely beyond what most could endure.” Jon’s stomach turns, and he takes a step back to keep from stumbling. Then she adds, “I know you are worried for her, but she has the strength of her mother. Whatever she’s suffered, she will come through it.” 

How can she claim this to be so, this woman who knows nothing of his sister? Yet, her words are so sure that he can’t help but be punched with the reality that he doesn’t know Sansa either, not really. 

They were never close as children, her mother made sure of that, and the last image he’d held of her was that of a delicate girl, brushing out Lady’s coat as she sang sweetly to the beloved wolf. If he held no hope of Arya surviving the horrors of the South, his faith in Sansa enduring all he’s just learned seems a thing of fantasy. 

And yet, she is here. She’s alive. She’d escaped the clutches of the Queen, of Baelish, of the Boltons, and she’d made her way north again to seek safety in her bastard brother’s arms. 

It is all just too much, then a searing truth pricks into his chest and blights him with shame. He is all she has left. In this entire cruel world, the one respite she could hope for was him, and that makes him mourn for her all the more. 

The squire returns holding a tray with a plate of bread, cheese, and hot soup. Behind him is a train of men in black come to draw the bath, one with the tub and the others carrying buckets of steaming water. Jon enters the solar with them, instructing them to work as quietly as they can as he supervises. When they’ve finished, they depart the room again, all but Edd who waits for the last man to leave before turning to his friend with concerned eyes. 

“Edd,” he croaks in utter agony. The man lifts his hand to Jon’s shoulder and grips him hard, telling him without words that everything will be alright. 

“I’ll make sure she isn’t disturbed,” he promises firmly. 

Jon nods his understanding, and his thanks, then Edd releases his grip and claps him once in a final gesture of support before leaving him alone with his heavy sorrow. 

His eyes peer down into the bath, a blurred reflection glaring back at him through the steam. _What now_ , he wonders in complete hopelessness, _what in Seven Hells am I supposed to do?_ The image in the water has the hateful nerve to look like his father, and Jon turns away from it in disgust. 

Lord Eddard Stark would know what to do without question. In fact, he’d never have let any of this happen to her in the first place. But Lord Stark is dead, and he is only an unworthy bastard, cursed to come back when the rest of them were still gone. Why couldn’t it be anyone else? Father, or Robb, or her mother. Why does he live when any of them would have been the savior she needs now? What could she have done to deserve such a cruel fate? 

“Jon?” 

Sansa’s panicked rasp pulls him from his self-pity at once and he rushes through the open door of his chamber to find her sitting up, clutching at his cloak still blanketing her shoulders as her terrified eyes search until they find him. 

He moves to the side of the bed, sitting carefully beside her and places his hand gently on her knees that she’s pulled protectively up to her chest. 

“Are you alright?” he asks foolishly, before realizing he’ll need to be more specific. “You fainted before.” 

Sansa looks around as if trying to remember the course of events, then she brings her eyes back to his and nods. 

“I have food and a bath prepared for you in the next room, when you’re ready, that is.” 

Sansa takes a deep breath and bends her folded knees to the side, causing Jon’s hand to fall away as he settles it on his bed. Her manner is more controlled now, almost worryingly so, and Jon leans back from her a bit as she shifts her posture further upright. 

He realizes then that she’s attempting to regain some form of propriety and he wants to tell her she doesn’t need to, not here, not with him. But then it occurs to him that perhaps this shift is not for his benefit, but her own practiced form of self-protection. 

Quietly, she pulls his cloak back from her shoulders and leaves it to rest on the bed as she shifts her legs over the side. Before she stands though, he sees her look down at the stained dress she’s no doubt been wearing for the entire fortnight it takes to travel from Winterfell to the Wall. 

Jon stands and moves to retrieves some clean clothes from his chest of drawers. When he returns to her, she’s on her feet, and he hands her the black tunic and black trousers apologetically. 

“I’ll have your things laundered but you can wear these in the meantime.”

“Thank you,” she whispers. 

Then he follows her to the solar and watches as she locates the provisions set out for her. She places the bundle of clothing on the table next to the drying towel that the men had brought along with the bath. He curses himself for only being able to provide the rough wool used by the rough men of the Night’s Watch and not some soft, lush fabric that would give her the comfort she needs. 

Her fingers brush lightly along the sponge, comb, and soap bar, another meager offering that fills him with shame, and Jon decides he must turn away from the state of it all now. 

“I’ll be in here,” he tells her from the doorway leading into his bedroom. “Is it alright if I leave the door cracked? I just want to be able to hear if you need anything.” 

Sansa closes her eyes and presses her hand to the table as if to steady herself. 

“Would you like me to fetch Lady Brienne to assist–”

“No,” she insists instantly. Worry contorts his face, but then she opens her eyes and repeats with more containment, “No, I can manage on my own.”

Jon nods to himself, then starts to retreat into his room but her eyes lift up to him and he waits. 

“Thank you, Jon.” 

He offers a slight smile in response, another terrible inadequacy, then leaves her to bathe in private as he pulls the door all but closed behind him. 

The soft sound of her moving throughout his solar becomes his anchor as he stands uselessly in the center of his room. It crosses his mind to pour himself a mug of ale, but he finds that his feet are cemented beneath him, his arms hanging heavy at his sides as he waits in silence for any sign of her earlier distress returning to her again. 

The trickling sound of water meets his ears and he guards her movements in his mind as he pictures her stepping into the tub. Then a pained moan pulls him with a jolt from his imaginings and he rushes to the door.

“Sansa? Are you alright?” 

Another choking cry reaches his ears and he wraps his fingers around the edge of the door, ready to pull it open until her answer stops him.

“No, don’t come in!” Another hitch in her voice follows, then she adds, “I’m alright. Please, Jon, just stay in there.” 

His head falls against the door, his knuckles turning white as he clutches its side through the gap. Then he takes a breath and moves back, pressing his back to the wall as he slides down to floor. 

He hears her crying and joins her in it as quietly as he can. Each time the water sounds with her movements, another hiss or groan or grunt of agony follows. The torture of listening to her suffer pulls his knees to his chest and he wraps his arms around them, pressing his face to his fists in a cowardly search for relief. He tells himself he would take every hurt, every sorrow from her if he could, but he knows he’d never be able to endure it. 

Jon realizes then that Brienne is right about Sansa’s strength. 

After an excruciating length of time passes, filled with the echoes of his sweet sister’s pain assaulting relentless into his ears, Jon hears the falling cascades of water as she stands from the tub. Then she dresses in near silence, the only sounds coming from the shifting of fabric and soft exertions. 

A few more torturous moments pass where Jon can’t hear anything at all. Then, just as he is about to call out for her again she says his name. 

“Jon, can you come in now?” 

He leaps to his feet and finds his pardon at last as he pulls open the door again. She is standing in the middle of the room, his clothes swimming on her even though she’s used her own belt to secure them in place. Her wet hair is combed neatly in a straight line down her back and the items she used to bathe are set back upon the table where she’d found them. In her hands is a tightly folded bundle of her own clothes that she seems unsure of where to put.

Jon walks to her and offers a gentle hand to take them from her and she hesitates for a moment before handing them over. He places them in a basket beside his chamber door and tells her they will be ready by the morning. 

“Do you think you could eat?” he asks, motioning to the plate of food. 

She doesn’t answer but sits down on the chair before the meal. Jon crosses the room to retrieve two cups, filling one with ale for himself and the other with water. Then, as he returns to where she sits, he glances down and sees the bath water soiled with dirt, and also blood. His face contorts and his breath leaves him as he takes in the sight, and he finds he is grateful for her back to be facing him as he confronts the horror of it. 

With every effort to steady his features, he crosses to the opposite side of the table and places the water before her, then takes a long drag of his ale as he sits. Her eyes remain on the food, though she’s yet to take a bite. 

“Should I get a maester to see to you?” he asks, only realizing after he’s spoken that there isn’t one to offer any longer. 

Sansa shakes her head in decline, then to Jon’s immense relief she lifts the bowl of soup into her hands. She takes a few small sips and he hopes that it is still warm enough to be soothing. Then he just watches her, not realizing the discomfort he’s causing with his silent scrutiny until her eyes lift pointedly back to his. 

Jon blinks in awkward retreat, taking another drink of his ale as he knows not what else to do. Then she sits her bowl back down and he looks at her again, finding her still staring at him with weary, but stable eyes. 

“What happened here?” she asks quietly, and he isn’t at all sure what she means. “Your things are packed, and you’re not wearing the Night’s Watch attire.” 

Suddenly he is reminded of all he was amidst before she appeared through the gates, and it seems like a strange dream long past. He takes a heavy breath and sits back in his chair. 

“I… I’m not in the Night’s Watch anymore, Sansa. I was preparing to leave when you arrived.” 

The expected confusion wrinkles her brow, but before she can ask the inevitable he adds, “It’s a long story, one I don’t wish to burden you with now.” 

Her eyes turn back to her plate, but she does not reach for anything on it. “I’d be happy for the distraction of someone else’s burden, Jon. But if you don’t wish to speak of it, I understand.” 

“I’m not sure you’d believe me,” he tells her honestly, “but if it would bring you some distraction then I could try.” 

Her eyes lift again with curiosity, and it is such a relief to see something other than pain in them that he begins to recount his strange tale. When he’s finished, he worries it foolishly did not provide her with anything but more fear.

“I’m still me,” he promises, interpreting her gape to be the realization that she’s dining with a ghost. “I don’t know how she brought me back, but she did. I’m sorry if I’ve frightened you, but that’s the truth of it.” 

Sansa’s eyes drift away from him, leaving him wrenched with regret, then she narrows her brow at the table and closes her mouth at last. After a few torturous moments of silence, he sees her shake her head as if waking herself from some pondering. 

“So…” she begins warily, “so the stories Old Nan told us, about the Long Night, it was all true? The White Walkers are _real_?” 

Her glance returns to him, and despite the nature of their discussion he finds himself receiving her search for his knowledge to be some small gift. He nods solemnly. 

“And you really fought them? And survived?” 

“Barely, but yes.”

Her face tightens further, but it’s no longer in fear. “I don’t understand, Jon. Why did they kill you? If you defended them from… from _that_ , then how could they want you dead? You’re a hero.” 

The way she says it holds no reverence or even astonishment, only truth, at least in her assessment. Jon doesn’t share her opinion, but he appreciates the reproach of his murderers just the same. 

“I suppose they didn’t think so,” he states wryly. When her frustration doesn’t abate, he tries to explain more earnestly. “The Walkers have been gone for thousands of years, so long that they were thought to be a myth. In all that time, the Wildlings have been the only enemy of the Night’s Watch. We’d only just finished fighting a war against them before I was named Lord Commander. And then I opened our gates and I let them through the Wall.”

Sansa sighs, seeming to understand, though she’s still frowning in disapproval and he loves her for that. Then her face falls into sorrow again and it greets him like a stranger when he sees it is meant for him. 

“I’m sorry they did that to you, Jon. It was a terrible thing.” 

Tears invade his eyes before he can stop it and he finds himself reaching across to take her hand. She flinches at the sudden movement though, and so he simply pats her once lightly before resting his touch back a few inches on the table. Then, to his astonishment, she opens her palm with invitation and he wraps his hand in hers, answering her gentle squeeze with his own. 

“Sansa, I…” she tenses in his hand but does not move away, “I’m glad you are here. I’m glad to see you again. I thought all of you were…” He sees her lips press together with the shared understanding that they were the only ones left now. “I would have come for you if I’d known.” 

A tear falls down her cheek and she pulls her touch from his at last to wipe it away. “You would have been killed, Jon. Or worse.”

Her answer is no mercy, no absolution, and Jon closes his empty hand. After accepting he's returned from death, after believing he's slain a monster from the stories meant to frighten them as children, she doubts his ability to slay her own. 

“How did you escape him, Sansa?”

Her eyes shift in suspicion between his before glancing at the door, and he sees her come to the realization that he’s learned more of her tribulation than she’s offered of her own accord. He looks down in confession, but then her answer pulls his attention back to her. 

“Theon helped me.” 

“Theon?” 

She nods and continues, keeping her gaze on the table, her face unreadable as she recounts the information with detachment. 

“He… Ramsay had him as a prisoner when I arrived at Winterfell. I didn’t know that at first. He’d kept him hidden away in the kennels, but I might not have recognized him anyway.” She takes a terrible breath that Jon soon realizes is out of pity for the man who’d betrayed Robb and he doesn’t understand. 

“Jon, he was so broken. Ramsay had tortured him for years, he wasn’t even called Theon anymore, but Reek." The word seems repulsive to her. "I found him in the kennels, covered in filth, barely able to speak. Ramsay told me he’d punished him for me, as if it were some sort of gift, but it was just the beginning of the sick games he would play with me, too.” 

Jon sits quietly as she speaks, willing his body to remain still. Despite his hatred for Theon, she is starting to reveal some of what happened to her, and he won’t do anything to jeopardize that if he can help it. 

“I hated Theon, and I hated that Petyr had left me alone with those wretched people. I didn’t know then all that had been done to him, but I was glad of whatever it was. Still, I didn’t have the capability of imagining the true extent of it all, not even close.”

She pauses for a moment and Jon is tempted to question her, or comfort her, but instead he decides to wait. Then, when she’s cleared the gloss from her eyes again, she continues. 

“He made Theon walk me down the aisle at our wedding wearing Robb's clothes, and he’d ordered him to take my arm but I refused. I said I wouldn’t touch him, and then he begged me, saying he would be punished if I didn’t, but I told him I didn’t care.”

More tears start to fall down her cheeks and Jon can see her hands shaking as she wipes them away. He aches to reach for her, to tell her that whatever happened to that traitor it wasn’t her fault and that she should spare no pity for him. But this is her story to tell. 

“I didn’t know, Jon.” 

She sniffs a wet breath, trying to contain her tears but they keep falling in a steady stream despite her efforts. He hands her a clean piece of cloth from the stack he keeps on the table to oil his sword. When she takes it, her eyes meet his again, but only for a moment before she buries them in the rag.

“It’s alright,” he tells her as gently as he can, “whatever it is you can tell me.” 

She takes a few deep breaths, wiping her nose before kneading the cloth between her trembling hands. 

“He did punish him,” she continues quietly, and Jon recognizes something new in her pained voice. It’s anger, a vicious anger he might have never imagined coming from Sansa if he wasn’t witnessing it for himself. “Only it was a punishment for both of us, a lesson in what happens when he is not obeyed.” 

Anger rises in Jon then, too. He notices his fists are clenched and he hides them in his lap so as not to frighten her back into silence. But when she tells him the truth of it, he regrets his desire to know.

“He… he made him watch, in his chambers that night, he made Theon watch as he pushed me on the bed and…” Sansa can’t finish the statement, but she doesn’t need to. Jon understands well enough. 

“He should’ve killed him,” he growls unintentionally, and then he realizes his mistake when she turns her brutal eyes back on him. Jon sighs. “I’m sorry, Sansa. I didn’t mean to… I’m sorry.” 

His last apology is not for what he’d said but for what happened to her. Still, his intrusion seems to shift something in her and she straightens herself a little, raising her shield of propriety once again. Jon reminds himself that this story ends with her escape, and that somehow Theon helped make that happen, so whatever it takes he vows to not speak again until she wants it.

“All day I would be locked in my room, and every night he would come and he would hurt me. I can’t speak of the things he did, Jon. I probably never will. But the only face I saw that wasn’t his was Theon’s. He’d bring me my trays as I lay in my bed, crying and shivering, waiting to die. And Theon would close the window against the storms I let in, praying they would freeze me until my heart gave out.” 

Suddenly, and to Jon’s startling surprise, Sansa stands and he watches her move as if in a trance. Taking her bowl of soup with her, she goes to sit by the fire, seemingly chilled by her own retelling of it all. He wonders if she’s decided to stop there, unable to endure much more as he was starting to feel. But when she continues he joins her, hoping it was only the chill she meant to escape and not him.

“One day I managed to confront him as he brought my breakfast. I asked him to help me, I begged him to, screaming at him that he’d betrayed my family. When I’d first arrived, an old servant woman told me that if I was ever in trouble I should light a candle in the broken tower and help would come. So, I gave him the candle and made him promise me he would do it.” 

Jon watches her cautiously, hoping this would be the part where she got away. To his unknowable horror, it wasn’t. 

“He tried to warn me,” she continues, her eyes fixed on the fire now in her trance. “Theon told me there was no escape, that Ramsay always knew. The next day, he sent for me. It was the first time I’d been outside of my room in… well, I don’t even know how long it had been. Ramsay met me on the battlements, said he wanted to show me something.” 

Sansa lowers her head, closing her eyes with the memory of it, and Jon braces himself for what was to come.

“She was on a cross,” she barely whispers, her eyes still shut tight. “He’d flayed her, the old woman, and left her in the yard as a warning for all to see. I knew then that if I was to ask for help from anyone else, he would punish me with their torture.” 

Jon lowers his own head into his hand, his temples throbbing at the relentless tale. He wants to scream, to hit something or kill something, but then he reminds himself she lived this and the least that he can do is tolerate hearing it. He is nauseous and dizzy but he gathers himself up as she continues, praying that she is almost through. 

“I was angry at Theon, for failing me, for being weak, but mostly for being right. The next I saw him I told him I was glad for what Ramsay had done to him. I said that if I could do the same to him I would. Then he told me he deserved it. He said that it was his punishment for betraying Robb and killing those boys, and I lost all control. I screamed at him, grabbed by the hair ready to rip it out. I said they weren’t ‘those boys,’ they were his brothers.”

Sansa sets her bowl aside and looks at Jon then, sharply, intently, as if she were no longer simply speaking her nightmare out loud, but talking directly to him. “He told me it wasn’t Bran and Rickon, that it was two farm boys and he’d burned the bodies so no one would know. They’re still alive, Jon.”

He sighs, unable to give her the shared relief she wants from him then. “I know,” he confesses.

“You do? How?” 

“My friend, Sam, he’s a brother of the Night’s Watch. He saw Bran and Hodor trying to get north of the Wall.” 

“What? Jon, why would he go up there?”

“I don’t know,” he admits sadly. The truth is, after what he’s seen up there, he can’t imagine Bran still lives. “I tried to find him, but I couldn’t.” 

“What about Rickon?”

Jon shakes his head. “He wasn’t with them. I don’t know where he went.”

Sansa's face falls a little, but Jon still sees a searching hope in her eyes. Even this is a strength in her that far outmatches his own. 

“That day,” she continues, “on the battlements before he showed me what he’d done, he told me you were Lord Commander of the Night’s Watch.”

His eyes narrow on her and some strange current passes through his body with the knowledge that she’d spoken of him in the midst of this nightmare. It is a selfish response at first, but soon chills when he imagines her learning of him so close, holding a position of such power, and yet he did not come to save her. 

“I was ready to give up,” she tells him, still peering mercilessly into his eyes. “But when I’d heard that you and Bran and Rickon were still out there, it gave me a reason to…”

The rest of her words drown in another choking sob. Again, he wants to reach for her, but only holds her with his eyes until she can go on. 

“When Stannis came to attack Winterfell, I took my chance. I’d stolen a tool from the battlements when Ramsay wasn’t looking and used it to pick the lock on my door. Then I went to the tower and lit the candle. But while I was up there, I saw Ramsay’s men swallow Stannis’ forces almost instantly. I knew I didn’t have much time, so I hurried back to my room but I was caught.” 

Jon swallows with dread, terrified of hearing another word of her garish tale. 

“It was Myranda, his… mistress I suppose, and Theon was with her. He begged me to go back to my room without struggling, but as she pointed an arrow at me something just snapped. I couldn’t take it anymore. I couldn’t beg anymore. So, I told her to just kill me.”

She sees Jon’s mouth fall open and straightens her back defensively. “I wasn’t giving up, Jon. I just… I can’t explain it. I guess I just thought, if it was going to happen anyway, I wanted it to be on my own terms. I know that sounds stupid–”

“It doesn’t.” 

She stares at him a moment and he curses himself for breaking his vow of silence once again, but then she softens a little, her shoulders relaxing again as if relieved he would understand. And he does understand, this part at least. If he could have chosen a way to die it would have been fighting, not helpless, not on his knees as the men sworn to follow him drove their knives into his heart. 

“She told me I couldn’t die, that Ramsay still needed me to give him an heir, but that he didn’t need all of me for that. Then she pointed the arrow at my leg, but before she released it Theon pushed her over the rail and she fell to her death.”

Jon sits back at this, eyes wide with shock. In truth, he’d been bracing so hard for the next detail of the harrowing events that he almost smiled in relief. But her story wasn’t over yet.

“Just then we heard the horns blow, signaling Ramsay’s return. Theon grabbed me and we ran to the other side of the battlements. Then we jumped.”

“You _jumped_? Sansa…” 

She doesn’t need the full extent of his question, as she’d known the fright of it herself. 

“The snow drifts were high that day. Even still, I don’t know how we survived the fall but we did. Then we ran as far as we could as fast as we could. We crossed through the river and nearly froze, but just kept running until I couldn’t go another step. We stopped to rest under the roots of a fallen tree, just for a moment, but that was enough for his men to catch up to us with the hounds.”

Jon puts his cup down on the floor and wipes his face. Every word of her story pummels him, again and again, as though he is living it himself. At every turn, he finds himself half expecting to hear it end in her death, until he is forced to remember that she couldn’t have died if she’s here. Still, he’s here too even though he had. Maybe there was a priestess waiting for her in the woods. Regardless, he doesn’t assume anything anymore. 

“Theon tried to lure them away, but they found me. I can still smell of foul breath of his hounds as the pawed at my chest. I thought it was over, but then like something out of a fairytale we were rescued.”

“Brienne?” 

Sansa nods. “And Podrick. The two of them rode up and cut all of them down, and Theon helped too. I know it sounds crazy, but for a moment I thought I had died and this was just some trick of the gods. It didn’t seem real, after all the times I’d waited like a fool for some knight to come and save me, from King’s Landing, from the Eyrie, then Winterfell. I thought it was all some demonstration of how stupid I had been. A stupid girl, with stupid dreams who never learns.”

He gives in to his need to hold her then and pulls her into his arms. To his relief, she lets him. Maybe this was all an illusion, maybe they were dead, both of them, but he doesn’t care. If death brought them together then he would thank the gods for their cruelty. 

“It was real, Jon.” Her tears wash over his neck and he pulls her closer. “It was real, you’re real, and I made it to you.” 

“Oh Sansa, my sweet, sweet Sansa. I’m sorry. I’m _so_ sorry.” 

He continues to soothe her, holding her close, rocking her gently as he caresses her back and presses kiss after kiss into her hair. Sansa weeps against him until she is emptied of all the strength she has left, resting in the safety of his arms at last. 

Soon they are both calm, sitting quietly beside each other again. Sansa stares into the fire and Jon stares at her, marveling at the miracle that she is. He’ll never know how she survived so much, and won’t allow himself the horrifying thought that there was more she’d enduring before even this, not now anyway. Now, he just wants to look at her and savor every moment with unyielding gratitude that she’s here. 

She takes a sip of her soup and he watches her still. Then she shifts her eyes to him, catching him in his stare, and even though he knows he should look away he can’t bring himself to do it. 

“This is good soup.”


End file.
